Looney-tunes .... attempted to be toned down to a more acceptable level.

They could have pulled out the troops leaving a huge vacuum for another problem group to fill and a mess which would eventually have to be dealt with at some point in the future. Once you break something there is a moral obligation to mitigate the damage, which is the reason for the delay.

There is a reason Libertarians attract ~10% of the vote. It is a fringe that has to ignore history and use logical fallacies to convince itself there is a utopia in a free market, which has never existed in the past, does not exist now, and cannot be sustained on its own in the future.

_________________With friends like Guido, you will not have enemies for long.

“Intellect is invisible to the man who has none” Arthur Schopenhauer

"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits."Albert Einstein

The regulations are much tougher in a free market, because you cannot commit fraud, you cannot steal, you cannot hurt people, and the failure has come that government wouldn't enforce this. In the Industrial Revolution there was a collusion and you could pollute and they got away with it. But in a true free market in a libertarian society you can't do that. You have to be responsible. So the regulations would be tougher."

Ron Paul understands it differently .....Bring the troops home! How? It's not that complicated. Just march the troops home as we marched them in!

Bring them in ready for Iran

War mongerers. I bet an invasion with Iran within 3 months. Implementing democracy all around so the globalists can seduce them all then gain control. Leading to a force that includes U.S.A Europe and then middle east where China and Russia join in to oppose the oppressor.

Hence world war iii

Why is it everyone wants to predict world stage events? Is it some kind of truth movement, a prophet in the making or do we really crave big events that make us entertained?

I think the west want to be entertained, and although they feel superficially sorry for the victims they never knew, see this as a bit of excitement in their mundane lives. I hope to hell I am wrong but I think this is the case that at the heart of things throughout the centuries we have become accustomed to fighting that is still inherent in our genes, modern society has cooled that fight yet we still need it as it is still in us thus viewing bombings of other countries through the media satisfies those 'lost' tribal instincts.

The shadows of the wise man will be enlightened when the wise man sees the shadow of himself.

Mothy.

Must be something else we say some way out of this place, building for a shallow grave. Enslaved to the money system. There is no antidote unless humans can live off grass.

Ron Paul understands it differently .....Bring the troops home! How? It's not that complicated. Just march the troops home as we marched them in!

Why is it everyone wants to predict world stage events? Is it some kind of truth movement, a prophet in the making or do we really crave big events that make us entertained?

Why do we, personally, want to be entertained? Isn't it a taste for distraction, even on the personal level? Why do we want drama and distraction in our personal lives? If we can't create personal drama, why do we feed it on the political level? Isn't it the same? Afterall, we are a planet floating in seemingly infinite space. What's the problem? Why do we even have problems? Why the need to create them?

I think the west want to be entertained, and although they feel superficially sorry for the victims they never knew, see this as a bit of excitement in their mundane lives. I hope to hell I am wrong but I think this is the case that at the heart of things throughout the centuries we have become accustomed to fighting that is still inherent in our genes, modern society has cooled that fight yet we still need it as it is still in us thus viewing bombings of other countries through the media satisfies those 'lost' tribal instincts.

The human brain is an evolved brain but still contains the animal brain. The animal brain is our heritage. I think we need to acknowledge that.

Enslaved to the money system. There is no antidote unless humans can live off grass.

To live off grass cannot possibly be the antidote because that would be too boring! But we have created this money system ..... I wonder if there is another way? I'm still wondering what third world debt is .... and why it is? Why not just absolve it?

Looney-tunes .... attempted to be toned down to a more acceptable level.

???? Toned down to a more acceptable level than who or what?

Quote:

They could have pulled out the troops leaving a huge vacuum for another problem group to fill and a mess which would eventually have to be dealt with at some point in the future. Once you break something there is a moral obligation to mitigate the damage, which is the reason for the delay.

I'm not sure what you mean Wayne. What would happen if the US wasn't there and had never been there? And what if the US had not ever set up its presence in 130 countries worldwide ... and what if the US had not decided to be the 'police' of the world in the first place, especially considering the expense and the sacrifice of such expense (ie: what else could the money have been used for and what if we had not used the mostly disenfranchised youth as fodder for the elite?)

Quote:

There is a reason Libertarians attract ~10% of the vote. It is a fringe that has to ignore history and use logical fallacies to convince itself there is a utopia in a free market, which has never existed in the past, does not exist now, and cannot be sustained on its own in the future.

I have not heard the word "utopia" issued from the mouths of any candidates. Nobody has offered a panacea thus far. And while Libertarians have garnered a smaller percentage of the vote historically, it would seem that Ron Paul is cracking that record. He is surpassing the traditional 10% .... and maybe for good reasons.

I applaud what he has to say about the war on drugs, for example. This has been a moral quibble much as the prohibition on alcohol was. The 1930's prohibition on alcohol gave power to the mafia and created more problems than it solved .... same with this prohibition on drugs which sees innocents put behind bars when they have never even committed a violent crime. Such a collosal waste of money and of young lives and such an excuse for the incarceration of the disnfranchised poor .... not to mention the warfare in Mexico! Talk about "felonious"! Adiction is clearly a social problem and not a felony. To treat it as a felony is to sweep it under the rug and create even more social problems. There is a movement afoot in the US to end the war on drugs and Ron Paul is at the forefront. This is BIG and no other right wing candidate (or left wing) has spoken to it with such clarity as Ron Paul has.

So anyways, just as my humour could be tweeked .... I invite your candidate tweeeks. Is there someone else who speaks as much sense? What candidate do you prefer and why?

I might add that while we consider these things, could we also remember that we are coming out of the shortest day of the year .... which would have been December 21-22. Our days are getting progressively longer now, but only by a minute or so each day. We are a planet revolving around the sun and we also have a beautiful moon revolving around our gorgeous planet ... as Earth revolves. Does this add perspective?

We have leaders now as ancient Egyptians had Pharoahs .... and the Egyptian people also revolted against those Pharoahs eventually. The question might be .... "Why do we have leaders at all'?

Looney-tunes .... attempted to be toned down to a more acceptable level.

???? Toned down to a more acceptable level than who or what?

Than his previous campaigns and the general position of the Libertarian party.

Quote:

Quote:

They could have pulled out the troops leaving a huge vacuum for another problem group to fill and a mess which would eventually have to be dealt with at some point in the future. Once you break something there is a moral obligation to mitigate the damage, which is the reason for the delay.

I'm not sure what you mean Wayne. What would happen if the US wasn't there and had never been there?

Never having been there has no basis in the discussion of pulling troops out. The fact was we went in a disrupted the existing government, which created a moral reason to fix what we had broken before we left. We also did not finish what we were there to do in Afghanistan until just recently. Iraq was more of a personal goal on many levels.

Quote:

And what if the US had not ever set up its presence in 130 countries worldwide ... and what if the US had not decided to be the 'police' of the world in the first place, especially considering the expense and the sacrifice of such expense (ie: what else could the money have been used for and what if we had not used the mostly disenfranchised youth as fodder for the elite?)

What if we just had ignored the wars elsewhere until they came to the point of the US being attacked? The Cold War could have had a much different ending and still may.

Quote:

Quote:

There is a reason Libertarians attract ~10% of the vote. It is a fringe that has to ignore history and use logical fallacies to convince itself there is a utopia in a free market, which has never existed in the past, does not exist now, and cannot be sustained on its own in the future.

I have not heard the word "utopia" issued from the mouths of any candidates.

I doubt if you will, but that is the description of how the Libertarians view what the country would have to be to make their free market ideas work.

Quote:

Nobody has offered a panacea thus far. And while Libertarians have garnered a smaller percentage of the vote historically, it would seem that Ron Paul is cracking that record. He is surpassing the traditional 10% .... and maybe for good reasons.

Because with the GOP pandering to the fringe it is easier for the elder Paul to run as a Republican than a Libertarian by not being quite as far to the left.

Quote:

I applaud what he has to say about the war on drugs, for example. This has been a moral quibble much as the prohibition on alcohol was. The 1930's prohibition on alcohol gave power to the mafia and created more problems than it solved

Not exactly if you actually look at the history and the reasons for the prohibition.

But by 1830, the average American over fifteen years old consumes nearly seven gallons of pure alcohol a year, three times as much as we drink today. Alcohol abuse, mostly perpetrated by men, wreaks havoc on the lives of many families, and women, with few legal rights or protection, are utterly dependent on their husbands for sustenance and support.

The average age of those being impacted by alcoholism rose, the numbers and percentages of those being hospitalized due to alcohol abuse, deaths due to alcohol use, and diagnosed health problems due to the use of alcohol were all lower for the decade during prohibition than the decade preceeding. This could have possibly been accomplished by better means, but that is how the GOP works in trying to legislate morals.

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.... same with this prohibition on drugs which sees innocents put behind bars when they have never even committed a violent crime.

By definition one is not innocent if one commits a crime. Violence as a criteria would be something Bernie Madoff wold love to be able to use to claim his innocence too.

Quote:

Such a collosal waste of money and of young lives and such an excuse for the incarceration of the disnfranchised poor .... not to mention the warfare in Mexico! Talk about "felonious"! Adiction is clearly a social problem and not a felony. To treat it as a felony is to sweep it under the rug and create even more social problems. There is a movement afoot in the US to end the war on drugs and Ron Paul is at the forefront. This is BIG and no other right wing candidate (or left wing) has spoken to it with such clarity as Ron Paul has.

If the war on drugs, or how to deal with addictive substances were the only job of government is would be a critical aspect.

Of course small things like shutting down the Dept. of Education and elimination of the EPA would be small potatoes compared to legalizing drugs.

Thanks to New Republic contributing editor James Kirchick, Americans know the creepy contents of the monthly newsletters published under Ron Paul's name in the 1980s and 1990s. The controversy stirred up by Kirchick's revelations also caused a former-Paul aide to come forward with his own recollections. "[Ron Paul] wishes the Israeli state did not exist at all," Eric Dondero wrote over Christmas. "He expressed this to me numerous times in our private conversations. His view is that Israel is more trouble than it is worth, specifically to the American taxpayer. He sides with the Palestinians, and supports their calls for the abolishment of the Jewish state, and the return of Israel, all of it, to the Arabs." Paul also allegedly has flirted with various conspiracy theories involving 9/11, and "strenuously does not believe the United States had any business getting involved in fighting Hitler in WWII."

<snip>

On many domestic issues, Paul's views aren't that much out of step with the his GOP rivals. Paul wants to shut-down the Department of Education. So do Michele Bachmann and Rick Perry. Paul wants to close down the EPA. So do Bachmann and Newt Gingrich (and Herman Cain, too, if anyone still cares). Paul, like Gingrich, wants to privatize the Post Office. He also opposes abortion, supports the repeal of Obamacare, rejects the idea of manmade global warming, champions English as America's national language and strenuously opposes illegal immigration. His only major dissents on social issues are the war on drugs (end it), and gay marriage, which he thinks should be left up to the states (as opposed to being pre-empted outright at the federal level).

Beyond America's shores, though, everything changes. Ron Paul is an isolationist who thinks Iran's nukes aren'tany of America's business, and slams his GOP rival's anti-Tehran "war propaganda." He's calling for $800-billion in defence cuts over the next four years, including the total elimination of all war funding. He wants to withdraw, not only from the UN (a popular stance with the GOP base), but from NATO as well. Under a Ron Paul presidency, all of America's foreign aid programs would be terminated. Israel would have to fend for itself, as would the oil-producing nations of the Gulf. Many American bases around the world would close, and the small nations that the United States now counts as its allies would look to second-and third-tier powers, such as Russia, China, Turkey, Iran and India for protection.

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So anyways, just as my humour could be tweeked .... I invite your candidate tweeeks. Is there someone else who speaks as much sense? What candidate do you prefer and why?

In the GOP field, they are all a bit more Looney tunes than I can call comfortable. Of course, the President cannot do much in the way of progressing without the support of Congress in any case.

Quote:

I might add that while we consider these things, could we also remember that we are coming out of the shortest day of the year .... which would have been December 21-22. Our days are getting progressively longer now, but only by a minute or so each day. We are a planet revolving around the sun and we also have a beautiful moon revolving around our gorgeous planet ... as Earth revolves. Does this add perspective?

Unless Ron Paul is affected by the moon, which may not be that far off, not really.

Quote:

We have leaders now as ancient Egyptians had Pharoahs .... and the Egyptian people also revolted against those Pharoahs eventually. The question might be .... "Why do we have leaders at all'?

Just asking.

Because the common individual is too ignorant to be able to make rational choices. To become educated enough on the various issues requires more time and effort than most will be able to apply. A pure democracy will collapse in upon itself due to the volume of decisions which have to be made.

_________________With friends like Guido, you will not have enemies for long.

“Intellect is invisible to the man who has none” Arthur Schopenhauer

"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits."Albert Einstein

Looney-tunes .... attempted to be toned down to a more acceptable level.

???? Toned down to a more acceptable level than who or what?

Than his previous campaigns and the general position of the Libertarian party.

Quote:

Quote:

They could have pulled out the troops leaving a huge vacuum for another problem group to fill and a mess which would eventually have to be dealt with at some point in the future. Once you break something there is a moral obligation to mitigate the damage, which is the reason for the delay.

I'm not sure what you mean Wayne. What would happen if the US wasn't there and had never been there?

Never having been there has no basis in the discussion of pulling troops out. The fact was we went in a disrupted the existing government, which created a moral reason to fix what we had broken before we left. We also did not finish what we were there to do in Afghanistan until just recently. Iraq was more of a personal goal on many levels.

But we wouldn't have to mitigate damage done if we hadn't done the damage in the first place. And as for personal goals, I don't believe the American people have any more tolerance for governments who run roughshod over other nations under the banner of "might is right". The Iraq war was a travesty.

Of the 13,000 American troops sent in, a whopping 30% have mental health issues and 4,500 of them are DEAD. Over 100,000 Iraqui's died in that war while 2,225,000 have been dispalced inside Iraq. 28% of Iraqui children suffer from chronic malnutrition. they have n unemployment rate of between 26-60% and 70% of Iraqi civilians have no access to adequate water supply. Who has time for crazy governments with personal goals?

And all of this carnage cost taxpayers in the trillions of dollars.

Quote:

And what if the US had not ever set up its presence in 130 countries worldwide ... and what if the US had not decided to be the 'police' of the world in the first place, especially considering the expense and the sacrifice of such expense (ie: what else could the money have been used for and what if we had not used the mostly disenfranchised youth as fodder for the elite?)

What if we just had ignored the wars elsewhere until they came to the point of the US being attacked? The Cold War could have had a much different ending and still may.

Where elsewhere? America invaded Iraq. And the 9/11 attack on the US? ..... the hornet's nest had been stirred. You just cannot have a superpower meddling in the affairs of other countries and not expect blowback. If the US wants security, it had better change its foreign policy and quit policing the world.

Quote:

Quote:

There is a reason Libertarians attract ~10% of the vote. It is a fringe that has to ignore history and use logical fallacies to convince itself there is a utopia in a free market, which has never existed in the past, does not exist now, and cannot be sustained on its own in the future.

I have not heard the word "utopia" issued from the mouths of any candidates.

I doubt if you will, but that is the description of how the Libertarians view what the country would have to be to make their free market ideas work.

Quote:

Nobody has offered a panacea thus far. And while Libertarians have garnered a smaller percentage of the vote historically, it would seem that Ron Paul is cracking that record. He is surpassing the traditional 10% .... and maybe for good reasons.

Because with the GOP pandering to the fringe it is easier for the elder Paul to run as a Republican than a Libertarian by not being quite as far to the left.

But I'm not sure he is pandering to the fringe. The fringe has occuppied Wall Street and are fed up.

Quote:

I applaud what he has to say about the war on drugs, for example. This has been a moral quibble much as the prohibition on alcohol was. The 1930's prohibition on alcohol gave power to the mafia and created more problems than it solved

Not exactly if you actually look at the history and the reasons for the prohibition.

But by 1830, the average American over fifteen years old consumes nearly seven gallons of pure alcohol a year, three times as much as we drink today. Alcohol abuse, mostly perpetrated by men, wreaks havoc on the lives of many families, and women, with few legal rights or protection, are utterly dependent on their husbands for sustenance and support.

And now alcohol is legal and still carries with it social problems. But other drugs have been prohibited and the social problem has been treated as "felonious" (I've come to love that word). The prohibition has created all kinds of crime; theivery, murder, gang violence, mafia violence, as well as the unjust punishment of people who basically have mental health issues. No wonder the states feel the need to build more prisons and has more of its population imprisoned than any other nation. Big business? The war on drugs needs to be history.

.... same with this prohibition on drugs which sees innocents put behind bars when they have never even committed a violent crime.

By definition one is not innocent if one commits a crime. Violence as a criteria would be something Bernie Madoff wold love to be able to use to claim his innocence too.

The point is that it should not be a crime. It should be veiwed as the social problem it actually is ... Otherwise, we are going to have to build even more prisons to incarcerate all those pot-smokers! Exile Nation. Go Charles!

Quote:

Such a collosal waste of money and of young lives and such an excuse for the incarceration of the disnfranchised poor .... not to mention the warfare in Mexico! Talk about "felonious"! Adiction is clearly a social problem and not a felony. To treat it as a felony is to sweep it under the rug and create even more social problems. There is a movement afoot in the US to end the war on drugs and Ron Paul is at the forefront. This is BIG and no other right wing candidate (or left wing) has spoken to it with such clarity as Ron Paul has.

If the war on drugs, or how to deal with addictive substances were the only job of government is would be a critical aspect.

It is a critical aspect as well as civil liberties, foreign policy, property rights, and the 1.4 trillion spent on militarism. It's all critical.

Of course small things like shutting down the Dept. of Education and elimination of the EPA would be small potatoes compared to legalizing drugs.

"Why do we have leaders at all'?

Just asking.

Because the common individual is too ignorant to be able to make rational choices. To become educated enough on the various issues requires more time and effort than most will be able to apply. A pure democracy will collapse in upon itself due to the volume of decisions which have to be made.[/quote]

Maybe if people weren't so busy making ends meet - having a little left over after doling out 25% of their income to feed the war and prison machines, they might be a little better educated. I think you take a dim view. Even if you are correct about people's ability to educate themselves, which you probably are under present circumstances, I think most people do not want BIG government and this is why I think Ron Paul is breaking the traditional mold of "pandering to the fringe". The "fringe" is becoming more and more mainstream. They are the 99% so to speak.

They could have pulled out the troops leaving a huge vacuum for another problem group to fill and a mess which would eventually have to be dealt with at some point in the future. Once you break something there is a moral obligation to mitigate the damage, which is the reason for the delay.

I'm not sure what you mean Wayne. What would happen if the US wasn't there and had never been there?

animal-friendly wrote:

Wayne Stollings wrote:

Never having been there has no basis in the discussion of pulling troops out. The fact was we went in a disrupted the existing government, which created a moral reason to fix what we had broken before we left. We also did not finish what we were there to do in Afghanistan until just recently. Iraq was more of a personal goal on many levels.

But we wouldn't have to mitigate damage done if we hadn't done the damage in the first place.

But that has no relation to the troops being pulled out now, as I stated.

Quote:

And as for personal goals, I don't believe the American people have any more tolerance for governments who run roughshod over other nations under the banner of "might is right". The Iraq war was a travesty.

They voted the same administration into office again .... what does that say?

Quote:

Of the 13,000 American troops sent in, a whopping 30% have mental health issues and 4,500 of them are DEAD. Over 100,000 Iraqui's died in that war while 2,225,000 have been dispalced inside Iraq. 28% of Iraqui children suffer from chronic malnutrition. they have n unemployment rate of between 26-60% and 70% of Iraqi civilians have no access to adequate water supply. Who has time for crazy governments with personal goals?

So if they have no time for "crazy governments" why vote them back into office and prolong the problem?

Quote:

Quote:

What if we just had ignored the wars elsewhere until they came to the point of the US being attacked? The Cold War could have had a much different ending and still may.

America invaded Iraq. And the 9/11 attack on the US? ..... the hornet's nest had been stirred. You just cannot have a superpower meddling in the affairs of other countries and not expect blowback. If the US wants security, it had better change its foreign policy and quit policing the world.

Yes, isolationism is such a good policy. If Japan had not attacked or if the Axis had not declared war in support of Japan the technological advances of Germany unchecked by US opposition could very well have changed the outcome significantly.

Quote:

Quote:

Nobody has offered a panacea thus far. And while Libertarians have garnered a smaller percentage of the vote historically, it would seem that Ron Paul is cracking that record. He is surpassing the traditional 10% .... and maybe for good reasons.

Because with the GOP pandering to the fringe it is easier for the elder Paul to run as a Republican than a Libertarian by not being quite as far to the left.

Quote:

But I'm not sure he is pandering to the fringe. The fringe has occuppied Wall Street and are fed up.

The conservative fringe is the Tea Party, which is on the other end of the spectrum from the Occupy movement.

Quote:

And now alcohol is legal and still carries with it social problems.

Legal, but somewhat controlled.

Quote:

But other drugs have been prohibited and the social problem has been treated as "felonious" (I've come to love that word). The prohibition has created all kinds of crime; theivery, murder, gang violence, mafia violence, as well as the unjust punishment of people who basically have mental health issues.

At least in jail there is a chance for some treatment, but the conservatives want to cut out any other assistance from the government.

Quote:

No wonder the states feel the need to build more prisons and has more of its population imprisoned than any other nation. Big business? The war on drugs needs to be history.

That seems to be the will of the people, especially those of the conservative leanings.

Quote:

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.... same with this prohibition on drugs which sees innocents put behind bars when they have never even committed a violent crime.

By definition one is not innocent if one commits a crime. Violence as a criteria would be something Bernie Madoff wold love to be able to use to claim his innocence too.

Quote:

The point is that it should not be a crime.

That still does not make the people innocent in any fashion.

Quote:

It should be veiwed as the social problem it actually is ...

But the GOP does not want to treat social problems, that is for some charity or another.

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Otherwise, we are going to have to build even more prisons to incarcerate all those pot-smokers! Exile Nation. Go Charles!

We will need them for the homosexuals who have the nerve to attack the sanctity of the institution of marriage and the women who use birth control.

Quote:

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Such a collosal waste of money and of young lives and such an excuse for the incarceration of the disnfranchised poor .... not to mention the warfare in Mexico! Talk about "felonious"! Adiction is clearly a social problem and not a felony. To treat it as a felony is to sweep it under the rug and create even more social problems. There is a movement afoot in the US to end the war on drugs and Ron Paul is at the forefront. This is BIG and no other right wing candidate (or left wing) has spoken to it with such clarity as Ron Paul has.

If the war on drugs, or how to deal with addictive substances were the only job of government is would be a critical aspect.

Quote:

It is a critical aspect as well as civil liberties, foreign policy, property rights, and the 1.4 trillion spent on militarism. It's all critical.

If everything is critical why is that the only clear issue of difference?

Of course small things like shutting down the Dept. of Education and elimination of the EPA would be small potatoes compared to legalizing drugs.

Quote:

Quote:

"Why do we have leaders at all'?

Just asking.

Because the common individual is too ignorant to be able to make rational choices. To become educated enough on the various issues requires more time and effort than most will be able to apply. A pure democracy will collapse in upon itself due to the volume of decisions which have to be made.

Quote:

Maybe if people weren't so busy making ends meet - having a little left over after doling out 25% of their income to feed the war and prison machines, they might be a little better educated.

Of course, you have ignored that money also goes to unemployment benefits, aid to the under employed, the Dept. of Education, the EPA, roads, waterways, and the like ... which shows the fallacy of this line of over-generalization.

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I think you take a dim view.

I do. The loudest ignorant people are the ones to which the politicians pander .... just after the businesses who buy their services with campaign donations.

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Even if you are correct about people's ability to educate themselves, which you probably are under present circumstances, I think most people do not want BIG government and this is why I think Ron Paul is breaking the traditional mold of "pandering to the fringe".

No, they want the government to send back more money than it takes from the region. That is the basis for most re-elections. The others pander to the attempt to legislate morals or to do something the person running cannot accomplish by themselves.

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The "fringe" is becoming more and more mainstream. They are the 99% so to speak.

The GOP is the party of the 1% fringe not the 99% .....

_________________With friends like Guido, you will not have enemies for long.

“Intellect is invisible to the man who has none” Arthur Schopenhauer

"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits."Albert Einstein

They could have pulled out the troops leaving a huge vacuum for another problem group to fill and a mess which would eventually have to be dealt with at some point in the future. Once you break something there is a moral obligation to mitigate the damage, which is the reason for the delay.

Quote:

I'm not sure what you mean Wayne. What would happen if the US wasn't there and had never been there?

Quote:

Never having been there has no basis in the discussion of pulling troops out. The fact was we went in a disrupted the existing government, which created a moral reason to fix what we had broken before we left. We also did not finish what we were there to do in Afghanistan until just recently. Iraq was more of a personal goal on many levels

Quote:

But we wouldn't have to mitigate damage done if we hadn't done the damage in the first place.

Quote:

But that has no relation to the troops being pulled out now, as I stated.

Quote:

And as for personal goals, I don't believe the American people have any more tolerance for governments who run roughshod over other nations under the banner of "might is right". The Iraq war was a travesty.

They voted the same administration into office again .... what does that say?

It was the Bush administration that sent the troops into Iraq.

Quote:

Of the 13,000 American troops sent in, a whopping 30% have mental health issues and 4,500 of them are DEAD. Over 100,000 Iraqui's died in that war while 2,225,000 have been dispalced inside Iraq. 28% of Iraqui children suffer from chronic malnutrition. they have n unemployment rate of between 26-60% and 70% of Iraqi civilians have no access to adequate water supply. Who has time for crazy governments with personal goals?

Quote:

So if they have no time for "crazy governments" why vote them back into office and prolong the problem?

Again, it was the Bush administration who sent the troops into Iraq and who made silly war-rhetoric pronouncements like, "The Axis Of Evil" and "If you're not with us, you're against us."

They could have pulled out the troops leaving a huge vacuum for another problem group to fill and a mess which would eventually have to be dealt with at some point in the future. Once you break something there is a moral obligation to mitigate the damage, which is the reason for the delay.

Quote:

I'm not sure what you mean Wayne. What would happen if the US wasn't there and had never been there?

Quote:

Never having been there has no basis in the discussion of pulling troops out. The fact was we went in a disrupted the existing government, which created a moral reason to fix what we had broken before we left. We also did not finish what we were there to do in Afghanistan until just recently. Iraq was more of a personal goal on many levels

Quote:

But we wouldn't have to mitigate damage done if we hadn't done the damage in the first place.

Quote:

But that has no relation to the troops being pulled out now, as I stated.

Quote:

And as for personal goals, I don't believe the American people have any more tolerance for governments who run roughshod over other nations under the banner of "might is right". The Iraq war was a travesty.

Quote:

They voted the same administration into office again .... what does that say?

It was the Bush administration that sent the troops into Iraq.

Yes, and he was a two term President was he not? The fact troops were sent in with less than credible or even cherry-picked intelligence still does not have any connection to the tropps never being sent being somehow equal to pulling them out at any particular time.

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Of the 13,000 American troops sent in, a whopping 30% have mental health issues and 4,500 of them are DEAD. Over 100,000 Iraqui's died in that war while 2,225,000 have been dispalced inside Iraq. 28% of Iraqui children suffer from chronic malnutrition. they have n unemployment rate of between 26-60% and 70% of Iraqi civilians have no access to adequate water supply. Who has time for crazy governments with personal goals?

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So if they have no time for "crazy governments" why vote them back into office and prolong the problem?

Again, it was the Bush administration who sent the troops into Iraq and who made silly war-rhetoric pronouncements like, "The Axis Of Evil" and "If you're not with us, you're against us."

I can't go further until you explain .... (?)

Explain what? That the two term admistration that screwed this up was re-elected in order to have that second term, thus indicating some popular support for that "crazy government"? The problems are being mitigated by the current administration in the scheduled draw down of troops in active combat roles. If it had not been for the Iraq diversion the Afghanistan issue may have been resolved earlier. I believe the actions of going into Afghanistan were legally and morally justified in that case. The same could not be said of Iraq, however.

_________________With friends like Guido, you will not have enemies for long.

“Intellect is invisible to the man who has none” Arthur Schopenhauer

"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits."Albert Einstein

Ron Paul is an isolationist who thinks Iran's nukes aren'tany of America's business, and slams his GOP rival's anti-Tehran "war propaganda." He's calling for $800-billion in defence cuts over the next four years, including the total elimination of all war funding. He wants to withdraw, not only from the UN (a popular stance with the GOP base), but from NATO as well. Under a Ron Paul presidency, all of America's foreign aid programs would be terminated. Israel would have to fend for itself, as would the oil-producing nations of the Gulf. Many American bases around the world would close, and the small nations that the United States now counts as its allies would look to second-and third-tier powers, such as Russia, China, Turkey, Iran and India for protection.

YEAH!!! YOU GO WAYNE!!

You really think its necessary to have a quarter million US military personnel based in over 700 US military bases in over 60 countries world wide??? Just look at what the United States spends on defense compared to other countries....